In 1985, Sanford and Johnston proposed the concept of parasite-derived resistance. They postulated that key gene products from a parasite expressed in the host in a dysfunctional form, in excess or at a wrong developmental stage, should disrupt the function of the parasite with minimal effect on the host (Sanford & Johnston, 1985). Using the QB bacteriophage as a model, they proposed that expression, in bacteria, of the bacteriophage coat protein or modified replicase or an antisense RNA complementary to the QB genome could all give resistance. They also proposed that such approaches would be applicable, in plants, to plant viruses and particularly the use of a modified plant virus replicase. The expression of the coat protein of the plant virus, tobacco mosaic virus (TMV), in tobacco was the first practical validation of this concept for plant virus resistance. This work (Powell-Abel et al., 1986) showed that the expression of the TMV coat protein, from a transgene under the control of the cauliflower mosaic virus 35S promoter, conferred on the plants resistance to TMV. The same group (Powell et al., 1990) showed that, generally, plants expressing higher levels of coat protein were more resistant to TMV than plants expressing low levels. Since this demonstration there have been very many examples of plants transformed with virus coat protein genes showing resistance (Table 1). There have also been a number of reports of plant virus resistance in plants expressing wild-type replicase (Braun and Hemenway, 1992, Brederode et al., 1995), truncated replicase (Carr et al. 1992), modified replicase (Longstaff et al. 1993), or antisense viral RNA (Kawchuck et al. 1991).
In 1992, Dougherty and colleagues were using different forms of the coat protein gene of tobacco etch virus (TEV) and discovered that some plants containing untranslatable “sense” coat protein genes and antisense coat protein genes showed extreme resistance (ER) to the virus (Lindbo & Dougherty, 1992 a,b). This resistance was functional at the whole plant level and at the single cell level. TEV was unable to replicate in protoplasts derived from ER plants but replicated to high levels in protoplasts from non-transgenic tobacco. Dougherty et al. concluded that the mechanism creating the extreme resistance for the untranslatable sense construct was not the same as the often reported coat protein-mediated strategy. They proposed that the mRNA of the untranslatable sense construct was hybridizing with the minus sense genome of the virus and interfering with the procession of replication complexes on the minus strand. They suggested that the use of viral sequence that could form intramolecular pairing should be avoided as this would interfere with their ability to hybridize to the target viral RNA.
TABLE 1Plant species that have been genetically engineered for virus resistance(from Rebecca Grumet, Hort Science 30[3] 1995)SpeciesVirusesTobaccoAIMV, ArMV, CMV, PVX,(Nicotiana tabacum L.)PVY, TEV, TGMV, TMV,TRV, TSV, TSWVOther Nicotiana spp.ACMV, BYMV, CyMV,(N. debneyii, N. benthamiana,CyRSV, BCTV, PEBV, PPV,N. clevelandii)PVS, WMVPotato (Solanum tuberusom L.)PI, RV, PVYTomatoAIMV, CMV, TMV, TYLCV(Lycopersicon esculentum L.)Cucumber (Cucumis sativus L.)CMVMelon (Cucumis melo L.)CMV, ZYMVAlfalfa (Medicago sativa L.)AIMVPapaya (Carica papaya L.)PRSVCorn (Zea mays L.)MDMVRice (Oryza sativa L.)RSVRapeseed (Brassica napus L.)TYMV
The Dougherty group expanded their investigations to plants containing untranslatable sense potato virus Y (PVY) coat protein genes. They obtained results similar to those with TEV and showed that the plants with ER had high transgene copy number, highly active transcription of the transgenes, and low levels of steady state mRNA from the PVY transgene (Lindbo et al. 1993, Smith et al. 1994). The following model for this mechanism of the resistance was proposed: the high level of transcription of the viral transgene triggers a cytoplasmic based, post transcriptional cellular surveillance system that targets specific RNAs for elimination. As the transgene encodes a transcript comprising viral sequences the mechanism not only degrades the transgene mRNA but also the same sequences in the viral genomic RNA. A key point in this model is the need for a high level of transcription of the transgene provided by high copy number (3-8; Goodwin et al. 1996). Alternatively, the RNA threshold required to trigger the mechanism can be reached by a more modest transcription level aided by the viral RNA from replication in early infection. This gives rise to a “recovery phenotype” where the plant is initially infected and shows symptoms but then produces new growth without virus symptoms and which are extremely resistant to infection.
This proposal was substantiated by the findings that gene silencing of non-viral transgenes could also be due to a post transcriptional mechanism (Ingelbrecht et al. 1994; de Carvalho Niebel et al., 1995) operating at an RNA level.
A link between non-viral gene silencing and this pathogen derived resistance was provided by inoculating transgenic plants, in which a GUS transgene was known to be silenced by a post transcriptional mechanism, with a virus containing GUS sequences (English et al. 1996). In this situation the plants were extremely resistant to the viral infection. However, the same plants were susceptible to the virus if they contained no GUS sequences.
The degree of viral resistance is not always directly related to the level of viral transgene transcription (Mueller et al., 1995; English et al., 1996) suggesting that there may be an alternative mechanism of inducing the resistance. To accommodate these discrepancies, an alternative model has been proposed in which the crucial factor affecting the resistance is not the level but the quality of the transgene mRNA (English et al. 1996). According to this model, the transgene can only induce resistance (or gene silencing) if it is transcribed to produce “aberrant” RNA. There have been many examples of post-transcriptional gene silencing and methylation of the transgene (Hobbs et al. 1990; Ingelbrecht et at 1994) and methylation of the transgene has also been found to be associated in some cases of extreme viral resistance (Smith et al. 1994, English 1996). In the proposed model, methylation of the transgene leads to the production of aberrant RNAs which induce the cytoplasmic RNA surveillance system. Baulcombe and English have suggested that this method of induction may be the same as that found for the silencing of met2 in A. immersus. In this system transcription of the met2 RNA was terminated in the methylated regions of the endogenous gene thus producing aberrant truncated RNAs. It was suggested that the methylation was a consequence of ectopic interaction between the transgene and a homologous region of a corresponding region of the endogenous gene (Barry et al. 1993). The presence of multiple transgenes would create an increased likelihood of ectopic pairing and is therefore consistent with the correlation between high copy number and extreme viral resistance (Mueller et al., 1995; Goodwin et al. 1996; Pang et al., 1996).
This whole area has been reviewed recently (e.g. Baulcombe (1996) and Stam et al. (1997)) and several models were presented. All models call for a high degree of sequence specificity because the resistance is very (strain) specific and therefore invoke base pairing interaction with an RNA produced from the transgene. One explanation for the induction of the virus resistance or gene silencing with sense transgenes is that the plant's RNA dependent RNA polymerase generates complementary RNAs using the transgene mRNA as a template (Schiebel et al. 1993a,b). This hypothetical complementary RNA (cRNA) has not been detected (Baulcombe 1996) but it is expected that the cRNAs will be small and heterodisperse RNAs rather than full complements (Schiebel 1993ab, Baulcombe 1996) and therefore difficult to detect.
The possible methods of action of the cRNA in mediating the virus resistance or gene silencing (as proposed by Baulcombe, 1996) are:    1: The cRNA hybridizes with transgene mRNA or viral RNA and the duplex becomes a target for dsRNases;    2: The cRNA hybridizes with target RNA to form a duplex which can arrest translation and consequently have an indirect effect on stability (Green, 1993);    3: The duplex formed between the cRNA and viral RNA causes hybrid arrest of translation of co-factors required for viral replication; and    4. The hybridization of the cRNA affects intra-molecular base pairing required for viral replication.
The current models for virus resistance or gene silencing thus involve the induction of a cytoplasmic surveillance system by either high levels of transgene transcription or by the production of aberrant single stranded mRNA. Once the system is triggered, RNA dependent RNA polymerase makes cRNA from the transgene mRNA. These cRNAs hybridize to the target RNA either directly affecting its translatability or stability, or marking the RNA for degradation.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,190,131 and EP 0 467 349 A1 describe methods and means to regulate or inhibit gene expression in a cell by incorporating into or associating with the genetic material of the cell a non-native nucleic acid sequence which is transcribed to produce an mRNA which is complementary to and capable of binding to the mRNA produced by the genetic material of that cell.
EP 0 223 399 A1 describes methods to effect useful somatic changes in plants by causing the transcription in the plant cells of negative RNA strands which are substantially complementary to a target RNA strand. The target RNA strand can be a mRNA transcript created in gene expression, a viral RNA, or other RNA present in the plant cells. The negative RNA strand is complementary to at least a portion of the target RNA strand to inhibit its activity in vivo.
EP 0 240 208 describes a method to regulate expression of genes encoded for in plant cell genomes, achieved by integration of a gene under the transcriptional control of a promoter which is functional in the host and in which the transcribed strand of DNA is complementary to the strand of DNA that is transcribed from the endogenous gene(s) one wishes to regulate.
EP 0 647 715 A1 and U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,034,323, 5,231,020 and 5,283,184 describe methods and means for producing plants exhibiting desired phenotypic traits, by selecting transgenotes that comprise a DNA segment operably linked to a promoter, wherein transcription products of the segment are substantially homologous to corresponding transcripts of endogenous genes, particularly endogenous flavonoid biosynthetic pathway genes.
W0 93/23551 describes methods and means for the inhibition of two or more target genes, which comprise introducing into the plant a single control gene which has distinct DNA regions homologous to each of the target genes and a promoter operative in plants adapted to transcribe from such distinct regions RNA that inhibits expression of each of the target genes.
W092/13070 describes a method for the regulation of nucleic acid translation, featuring a responsive RNA molecule which encodes a polypeptide and further includes a regulatory domain, a substrate region and a ribosome recognition sequence. This responsive RNA molecule has an inhibitor region in the regulatory domain, which regulatory domain is complementary to both a substrate region of the responsive RNA molecule and to an anti-inhibitor region of a signal nucleic acid such that, in the absence of the signal nucleic acid, the inhibitor and substrate regions form a base-paired domain the formation of which reduced the level of translation of one of the protein-coding regions in the responsive RNA molecule compared to the level of translation of that one protein-coding region observed in the presence of the signal nucleic acid.
Metzlaff et al., 1997 describe a model for the RNA-mediated RNA degradation and chalcone synthase A silencing in Petunia, involving cycles of RNA-RNA pairing between complementary sequences followed by endonucleolytic RNA cleavages to describe how RNA degradation is likely to be promoted. Fire et al., 1998 describe specific genetic interference by experimental introduction of double-stranded RNA in Caenorhabditis elegans. The importance of these findings for functional genomics is discussed (Wagner and Sun, 1998).
Que et al., 1998 describe distinct patterns of pigment suppression which are produced by allelic sense and antisense chalcone synthase transgenes in petunia flowers and have also analyzed flower color patterns in plants heterozygous for sense and antisense chalcone synthase alleles.
WO 98/05770 discloses antisense RNA with special secondary structures which may be used to inhibit gene expression.
WO 94/18337 discloses transformed plants which have increased or decreased linolenic acids as well as plants which express a linoleic acid desaturase.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,850,026 discloses an endogenous oil from Brassica seeds that contains, after crushing and extracting, greater than 86% oleic acid and less than 2.5% α-linolenic acid. The oil also contains less than 7% linoleic acid. The Brassica seeds are produced by plants that contain seed-specific inhibition of microsomal oleate desaturase and microsomal linoleate desaturase gene expression, wherein the inhibition can be created by cosuppression or antisense technology.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,638,637 discloses vegetable oil from rapeseeds and rapeseed producing the same, the vegetable oil having an unusually high oleic acid content of 80% to 90% by weight based on total fatty acid content.